Thomas Keneally | The Guardianhttp://www.theguardian.com/profile/thomaskeneally
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The Man Booker prize is a lottery, but Flanagan has utterly earned his good fortune | Thomas Keneallyhttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/oct/16/thomas-keneally-richard-flanagan-man-booker-prize
<p>The Man Booker prize is a lottery, but Flanagan is a fine novelist who has utterly earned his good fortune</p><p>We all know prizes are a lottery. But in the lottery of the Man Booker, Richard Flanagan did not only have a ticket. He had the best ticket. The jury saw it, and punched it for him. His book had been declared the best novel in the English-speaking world.<br /></p><p>The Narrow Road to the Deep North is indeed a stellar book and few would argue with that claim. It is a book full of significance, but very accessible – Flanagan has a gift for being brisk at narrative, but also for conveying serious and complex ideas painlessly. Unlike most of us, he doesn’t overwrite scenes. I envy his economies, his poetics and his capacity to play with time – time being the servant of Richard’s novels, not their linear master. </p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/oct/16/thomas-keneally-richard-flanagan-man-booker-prize">Continue reading...</a>Richard FlanaganMan Booker prize 2014Awards and prizesBooker prizeCultureFictionBooksAustralia newsWed, 15 Oct 2014 22:50:02 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/oct/16/thomas-keneally-richard-flanagan-man-booker-prizePhotograph: Richard Saker/ObserverThomas Keneally: “Despite all the clichéd assumptions about garrets, etc, security is good for creativity, and poverty’s bad.”Photograph: Richard Saker/ObserverThomas Keneally: “Despite all the clichéd assumptions about garrets, etc, security is good for creativity, and poverty’s bad.”Thomas Keneally2014-10-15T22:50:02ZThe Narrow Road to&nbsp;the&nbsp;Deep&nbsp;North by Richard Flanagan – reviewhttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/jun/28/narrow-road-deep-north-richard-flanagan-review
Flanagan offers a rich insight into how the Burma railway claimed the lives of Australian PoWs, even after they had survived the camps<p>Richard Flanagan, the Tasmanian writer acclaimed for such novels as <em>Death of a River Guide</em> and <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/jun/01/featuresreviews.guardianreview23" title=""><em>Gould's Book of Fish</em></a>, has a right to focus on the so-called Burma railway, built with forced labour by the Japanese in the second world war. His father was an Australian prisoner of war on the infamous &quot;narrow road&quot;, and the railway ran through his childhood, too. Let me say, though, that his book ranges far in time and human fascination beyond that central and barbarous piece of engineering.</p><p>His Australian protagonist is a surgeon, Dorrigo Evans, who to his own amazement becomes legendary in postwar Australia for his wartime courage in the face of Japanese captors. By his middle years he is a national figure – his own face staring back at him &quot;from charity letterheads to memorial coins&quot;. Dorrigo's boyhood took place far from the grief and benefits of the big world, however. Innocent of electricity, his family &quot;slept under skins of possums they snared&quot;. He is elevated to medicine as a scholarship boy, and, in a splendid set piece in an Adelaide bookshop, Dorrigo, now a military surgeon, meets a small-framed, gleaming-eyed and galvanising woman named Amy. The affair is somehow permissible because &quot;the war pressed, the war deranged, the war undid, the war excused&quot;. The fact that Amy is married to his uncle would be clunky in other hands, but is&nbsp;utterly convincing here.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/jun/28/narrow-road-deep-north-richard-flanagan-review">Continue reading...</a>FictionHistoryBooksCultureRichard FlanaganSat, 28 Jun 2014 07:00:03 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/jun/28/narrow-road-deep-north-richard-flanagan-reviewKaren Trist/Getty ImagesA section of the Burma railway in Kanchanaburi, Thailand. Photograph: Karen Trist/Getty ImagesKaren Trist/Getty ImagesA section of the Burma railway in Kanchanaburi, Thailand. Photograph: Karen Trist/Getty ImagesThomas Keneally2014-06-28T07:00:03ZBritish values, Michael Gove? Here's help from abroad on what they arehttp://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/jun/15/british-values-michael-gove-thomas-keneally-schools
Cameron and Gove <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/jun/09/michael-gove-says-all-schools-must-promote-british-values-after-trojan-horse-reports" title="">want 'British values' taught in schools</a> – but what exactly are these? Here, Thomas Keneally and five other writers from elsewhere who know Britain well give their answers<p><strong><em>Thomas Keneally</em></strong><em>, Australian writer</em></p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/jun/15/british-values-michael-gove-thomas-keneally-schools">Continue reading...</a>CommunitiesImmigration and asylumPoliticsThomas KeneallyBooksSat, 14 Jun 2014 23:05:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/jun/15/british-values-michael-gove-thomas-keneally-schoolsChristian Sinibaldi/GuardianXiaolu Guo, writer and filmmaker, photographed in her house in Hackney, east London. Photograph: Christian Sinibaldi for the GuardianGeraint Lewis/REX/Geraint Lewis/REXChika Unigwe Photograph: Geraint Lewis/REXMichael Sharkey/guardian.comDavid Gordon Photograph: Michael Sharkey/guardian.comRichard Saker/ObserverThomas Keneally: 'I love yez, Poms!' Photograph: Richard Saker for the ObserverRichard Saker/ObserverThomas Keneally: 'I love yez, Poms!' Photograph: Richard Saker for the ObserverThomas Keneally, Xiaolu Guo, Chika Unigwe, David Gordon, Herman Koch and Yan Lianke2014-06-14T23:05:00ZShame and the Captives by Thomas Keneally – reviewhttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/may/03/shame-captives-thomas-keneally-review-compelling-japanese-outback
Keneally's ingenuity comes to the fore in this compelling fictionalised account of how Japanese PoWs staged a breakout in New South Wales<p>As a child of the second world war, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/thomas-keneally" title="">Thomas Keneally</a> has vivid memories of the midwinter night in 1944 when a group of Japanese prisoners staged a breakout from an internment camp close to the New South Wales town of <a href="http://www.naa.gov.au/collection/fact-sheets/fs198.aspx" title="">Cowra</a>. In the introduction to this fictionalised retelling of events, he recalls a great aunt who took to sleeping with an axe, and farmers leaving rifles for their wives: &quot;We did not understand its motives which lay beyond the horizons of our culture and imagination,&quot; Keneally writes. &quot;We judged them to include the intent to do unspeakable damage to women, children and men, in that order.&quot;</p><p>More than 230 Japanese were killed during the escape (along with a small number of Australian guards) and all the survivors were recaptured within 10 days. Though Keneally's novel is grounded in fact, it replaces the town of Cowra with an imagined equivalent named Gawell. And though the correspondences are clear, the passage of time enables Keneally to reveal the true motive behind the breakout: it was not a show of aggression intended to terrorise the population, so much as a grand, tragic act of self-immolation.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/may/03/shame-captives-thomas-keneally-review-compelling-japanese-outback">Continue reading...</a>FictionBooksCultureSat, 03 May 2014 07:45:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/may/03/shame-captives-thomas-keneally-review-compelling-japanese-outbackRichard Saker/Richard Saker'Fiction has always tried to tell the truth by telling lies' … Thomas Keneally Photograph: Richard SakerRichard Saker/Richard Saker'Fiction has always tried to tell the truth by telling lies' … Thomas Keneally Photograph: Richard SakerAlfred Hickling2014-05-03T07:45:00ZAustralian writers pick their favourite artworks from the homelandhttp://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/australia-culture-blog/2013/sep/21/australian-writers-favourite-art
<strong>Thomas Keneally</strong>, <strong>Christos Tsiolkas</strong>, <strong>Carmen Callil</strong> and others choose the works that most strongly capture the spirit of their home country<p><a href="http://www.rosemaryvaladon.com.au/" title="">Rosemary Valadon</a> is an underappreciated Australian artist. I see her in the tradition of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/culture/australia-culture-blog/2013/jul/10/sydney-moderns-female-artists" title="">Grace Cossington Smith</a> and <a href="http://www.margaretpreston.info" title="">Margaret Preston</a>, Australian women artists who reimagined the domestic Australian aesthetic. This is particularly so with Valadon's vibrant still-life paintings. Her palate is fresh, modern and sensual. My favourite part of her body of work is her <a href="http://www.rosemaryvaladon.com.au/portfolio/the-goddess-series/" title="">&quot;goddess series&quot;</a> and one of the standout pieces of that is <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/profile/germainegreer" title=""><em>Germaine Greer</em></a><em> as Artemis</em> (the Greek goddess of the hunt). The series, and this portrait in particular, evokes an Australian femininity and feminism – bold statements in a country where misogyny is still so prevalent in public discourse. I love the&nbsp;interpretation of Greer, an iconic feminist, in the role of Diana. She stands against lush foliage but at the same time, as she holds a cat, we see a nurturing side of the female warrior.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/australia-culture-blog/2013/sep/21/australian-writers-favourite-art">Continue reading...</a>ArtArt and designFictionBooksCultureChristos TsiolkasAustralia newsFri, 20 Sep 2013 23:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/australia-culture-blog/2013/sep/21/australian-writers-favourite-artPRDetail from Rosemary Valadon's Germaine Greer as Artemis. Click to enlarge imagePRDetail from Rosemary Valadon's Germaine Greer as Artemis. Click to enlarge imageGuardian Staff2013-09-20T23:01:00ZWhy I love the Guardian’s crosswords | Thomas Keneallyhttp://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/may/26/thomas-keneally-guardian-crosswords
Of all the cryptic crosswords of all the newspapers on Earth, my favourite is the Guardian's. Here's why<p>The crossword and cricket, along with a fairly passable language, are the chief British contributions to world culture. Try to do a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/crosswords/index.html?page=home&amp;_r=0">New York Times crossword</a> and it’s all current affairs quiz muck and acronyms. It’s not <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/places/bletchley_park">Bletchley Park</a> and code-breaking. Of all the cryptic crosswords of all the newspapers on Earth <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/crosswords/series/cryptic">my favourite is the Guardian’s</a>, because I’ve got to understand the setters, from the amusing and lenient Rufus on Monday all the way to that <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/crosswords/crosswords+profile/araucaria">stern test set by Auracaria</a>, a nonagenarian clergyman who rightly names himself after the Latin tag for the monkey-puzzle tree.</p><p>But I respect the Guardian crossword too because it demands a lot of me, and sometimes too much. Because I’m better rested and better able to do the early <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/crosswords/series/quick">weekday puzzles</a> than I am to face the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/crossword/genius">Genius puzzle</a> of Saturdays which have consistently proven one thing: that I’m no genius. The Guardian, you see, has a weekly scale of difficulty. I like the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/crosswords/series/everyman">Everyman</a> on Sunday, however, because it seems to take merciful account of the fact that you might have knocked out a few brain cells, and made the memory less alacritous and the sub-conscious less Eureka-moment ready, with the wine drunk on Saturday evening.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/may/26/thomas-keneally-guardian-crosswords">Continue reading...</a>CrosswordsMon, 27 May 2013 03:33:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/may/26/thomas-keneally-guardian-crosswordsPhotograph: Linda Nylind/GuardianGuardian cryptic crossword Photograph: Linda Nylind for the GuardianPhotograph: Public DomainGuardian crossword - 5 January Photograph: Public DomainThomas Keneally2013-05-27T03:33:00ZAdelaide Writers' Week - in pictureshttp://www.theguardian.com/culture/gallery/2013/mar/05/adelaide-festival-2013-australia
International authors from Thomas Keneally to Madeleine Thien and Tom Holland have been speaking and debating at Adelaide's Writers' Week, where they were photographed by Alicia Canter <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/culture/gallery/2013/mar/05/adelaide-festival-2013-australia">Continue reading...</a>Adelaide festival 2013Australia newsCultureBooksPoetryAdelaideTue, 05 Mar 2013 03:55:54 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/culture/gallery/2013/mar/05/adelaide-festival-2013-australiaAlicia Canter for the GuardianMelbourne-based poet L. K. Holt, Thomas Keneally author of Schindler's Ark and Karen Lord, author of Redemption in Indigo. Photograph: Alicia Canter for the GuardianAlicia Canter2013-03-05T03:55:54ZHappy Valley by Patrick White – reviewhttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/dec/19/happy-valley-patrick-white-review
Patrick White's first novel bears testament to his genius. By Thomas Keneally<p>Patrick White was one of those writers who won the Nobel prize for literature because he really deserved it. His greatest works, such as <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2002/nov/16/featuresreviews.guardianreview6" title=""><em>Voss</em></a>, <em>The Tree of Man</em> and <em>Riders in the Chariot</em>, are novels anyone would be poorer for not having read. But it is interesting that despite his genius and international reception, he was not beloved in Australia, where the 100th anniversary of his birth has just been celebrated. Perhaps it is because his novels can be seen as almost non-egalitarian. And if we wanted him to be a huggable item of Australian fauna, he was determined not to be. He was a prophet, and from his sublime mountaintop, he sent down lightning bolts on our callow heads. Some of these bolts are vivid in <em>Happy Valley</em>, his first novel, published in 1939 and now reissued.</p><p>White was a natural gnostic – he believed people were divided between, on the one hand, those who know, and perceive the world with a tentative, costly but exacting sharpness and delicacy; and on the other, the mass of chancers and doltish worthies who seem to flourish in it. In White, the meek certainly don't inherit the earth, nor is the earth worthy of them. It is a fallen place in tune spiritually with the novel's Mr Belper, bank manager and unreliable financial prophet, and with Furlow, the pastoralist whom the acreages of Happy Valley have made rich and numb and mindless.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/dec/19/happy-valley-patrick-white-review">Continue reading...</a>FictionBooksCultureWed, 19 Dec 2012 08:00:06 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/dec/19/happy-valley-patrick-white-reviewWilliam Robinson/AlamyPatrick White: 'If we wanted him to be a huggable item of Australian fauna, he was determined not to be.' Photograph: William Robinson/AlamyWilliam Robinson/AlamyPatrick White: 'If we wanted him to be a huggable item of Australian fauna, he was determined not to be.' Photograph: William Robinson/AlamyThomas Keneally2012-12-19T08:00:06ZAustralia's painful journey towards indigenous rightshttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/06/australias-journey-indigenous-rights
The fracas that engulfed the country's prime minister during Aboriginal protests on Australia Day speaks volumes about a society still coming to terms with its past<p>In saying that I have conflicting views about <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/26/australian-prime-minister-tent-protesters" title="">the hustling of Julia Gillard, the prime minister</a>, to her car through a cordon of Aboriginal demonstrators and police on Australia Day last month, I am merely reflecting a genuine confusion many of us feel. The protesters later said that their anger was directed at the opposition leader, muscular, all-surfing, all-bicycling, former Catholic seminarian (like me) neocon (unlike me) Tony Abbott. Yet I have to say Abbott's remarks about the determinedly ramshackle <a href="http://www.aboriginaltentembassy.net/" title="">Aboriginal Tent Embassy</a> in Canberra, founded 40 years ago, did not seem to me racist or wild.</p><p>I assert this though I am not an admirer of Abbott's. The idea of his winning the prime ministership from the unpopular Labor leader, Gillard, makes me fantasise about political asylum in Scunthorpe. But this is what Abbott said about the Tent Embassy: &quot;I think a lot has changed for the better since then [the setting-up of the Embassy]. I think the indigenous people of Australia can be very proud of the respect in which they are held by every Australian … I think it probably is time to move on from that.&quot;</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/06/australias-journey-indigenous-rights">Continue reading...</a>Australia newsIndigenous peoplesWorld newsAsia PacificJulia GillardRace issuesAustralian politicsMon, 06 Feb 2012 20:30:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/06/australias-journey-indigenous-rightsLukas Coch/EPABodyguards hustle Prime Minister Julia Gillard away during an Aboriginal protest on Australia Day in Canberra. Photograph: Lukas Coch/EPAThe Sydney Morning Herald/Fairfax Media via Getty ImagesAboriginal and other protesters interrupt an Australia Day awards ceremony in Canberra. Photograph: The Sydney Morning Herald/Fairfax Media via Getty ImagesThe Sydney Morning Herald/Fairfax Media via Getty ImagesAboriginal and other protesters interrupt an Australia Day awards ceremony in Canberra. Photograph: The Sydney Morning Herald/Fairfax Media via Getty ImagesThomas Keneally2012-02-06T20:30:00ZTravel: Dickens down underhttp://www.theguardian.com/travel/2010/nov/07/dickens-down-under-australia
More than a century ago, two of Charles Dickens's sons went to New South Wales to seek their fortune. The award-winning Australian author Thomas Keneally retraces their steps in a harsh but beautiful land<p>This month rain is falling widely on the earth 1,000km or more northwest of Sydney. It did the same in the late 19th century, which broke the hearts of Charles Dickens's sons. Anthony Trollope's son Frederick lived there too, in Wilcannia, the same town as Edward (Plorn) Dickens, attending the same picnics, race meetings, cricket matches and rowing regattas.</p><p>In a bad season the Dickens's country (as I think of it) can seem no better than desert. When he was elected as member for Wilcannia to the New South Wales parliament, Dickens's youngest son Plorn (born 1852) gave his fellow legislators a&nbsp;rundown on the erratic rains in the towns of the region he represented. In 1884, a half-good year. In Milparinka 2.18in had fallen, in Bourke 6.83in, in Wilcannia 3.23in, in Pack Saddle 2.11. Things have not got much better there in this century, and may even have grown a little worse.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2010/nov/07/dickens-down-under-australia">Continue reading...</a>TravelCharles DickensAustraliaSun, 07 Nov 2010 00:05:26 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/travel/2010/nov/07/dickens-down-under-australiaDavid Wall/AlamyThe Princess paddle steamer on the Murray River in New South Wales. Photograph: David Wall/AlamyDavid Wall/AlamyThe Princess paddle steamer on the Murray River in New South Wales. Photograph: David Wall/AlamyThomas Keneally2010-11-07T00:05:26ZYour letters: Tell us what you thinkhttp://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2009/sep/19/readers-letters-guardian-weekend
Much as she denies it, audiences do fall in love with Judi Dench on stage (well, some of us do), plus was Thomas Keneally on to something about Australian male sexuality, and Wrecks of the Week that aren't really<p>Judi Dench says Ian McKellen's observation that &quot;audiences fall in love with her&quot; is &quot;crap&quot; (<a href="http://http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/sep/12/judi-dench-interview" title="" i="" don't="" take="" any="" of="" it="" for="" granted.="" ever,""="">&quot;I Don't Take Any Of It For Granted. Ever,&quot;</a> 12&nbsp;September). She surely cannot be unaware of her effect on us boys when we visited the Nottingham Playhouse to see her in Saint Joan in the mid-60s. For most of us, it was our first visit to a &quot;proper&quot; theatre and to see this young girl on a vast stage taking on the English was more than memorable. I&nbsp;can't remember if&nbsp;I passed O-level English but I will always remember Ms Dench.<br /><strong>Allan McRobert</strong> Dunfermline, Fife</p><p>I was trying to think of a riposte to Dench's remark about not being a&nbsp;feminist when I read the Hilary Mantel interview (main paper, 12&nbsp;September): &quot;For a woman to say, 'I'm not a feminist' is like a lamb joining the slaughter guild. It's empty-headed and stupid.&quot;<br /><strong>Lynda Mannix</strong> East Grinstead, West Sussex</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2009/sep/19/readers-letters-guardian-weekend">Continue reading...</a>Fri, 18 Sep 2009 23:10:31 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2009/sep/19/readers-letters-guardian-weekendMartin Godwin/Guardianletters1 Photograph: Martin GodwinGuardian Staff2009-09-18T23:10:31ZThomas Keneally on what the bushfires reveal about Australia and the impact of climate changehttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/feb/20/australia-climatechange
Are bushfires inevitable - or can they be managed? When they strike again, should people flee or fight the flames? The catastrophic blazes in Australia have left its inhabitants full of questions, doubts and fears. Novelist Thomas Keneally considers the fallout<p>In view of the scale of this fire's consumption of humans, animals, houses and large and small treasures, it can seem almost obscene to mention history. But in April 1770, Captain Cook, passing a northern New South Wales headland in his barque, Endeavour, saw the voluminous smoke of a bushfire, lit by Aborigines for the purpose of flushing out animals. He called the place Smoky Cape. </p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/feb/20/australia-climatechange">Continue reading...</a>Australia newsClimate changeNatural disasters and extreme weatherEnvironmentWorld newsAsia PacificAustralia weatherFri, 20 Feb 2009 00:01:00 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/feb/20/australia-climatechangeAlex Coppel/Rex/NewspixJulie Whiteley lost her entire house though managed to take her kids to safety before the fires hit. Photograph: Alex Coppel/Rex/NewspixAPA fire truck moves away from the flames of a bushfire in the Bunyip Sate Forest near the township of Tonimbuk, west of Melbourne, Australia. Photograph: APAndrew Brownbill/EPAA Country Fire Authority firefighter takes a break while fighting a bushfire at Bunyip state forest near Tonimbuk, Australia Photograph: Andrew Brownbill/EPAAndrew Brownbill/EPAA Country Fire Authority firefighter takes a break while fighting a bushfire at Bunyip state forest near Tonimbuk, Australia Photograph: Andrew Brownbill/EPAThomas Keneally2009-02-20T00:01:00ZPeter Carey warns of dire threat to Australian publishinghttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/jan/29/peter-carey-warns-threat-to-australia-publishing
<p>It would be &quot;cultural 'self-suicide'&quot;, says Peter Carey. A tragedy which would force many Australian authors to stop writing, adds Kate Grenville, while Thomas Keneally believes it would cause &quot;irreparable harm&quot;. The Australian books world, from major authors such as Carey, Grenville and Keneally to publishers, booksellers and agents, is up in arms about a government review of Australia's copyright laws.</p><p>As the law currently stands, Australian publishers have a window of 30 days to bring out an Australian edition of a book once it has been released anywhere in the world. If they do so, then Australian bookshops have to sell the Australian version, and can't import the book from overseas. This can mean that books are more expensive - and harder to get hold of - in Australia than they are elsewhere, but also allows the country's local publishing to flourish, rather than forcing it to compete with a flood of cheaper-priced editions from overseas.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/jan/29/peter-carey-warns-threat-to-australia-publishing">Continue reading...</a>BooksPublishingPeter CareyCultureThu, 29 Jan 2009 15:42:52 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/jan/29/peter-carey-warns-threat-to-australia-publishingEamonn McCabe/GuardianPeter Carey speaks of a 'battle for the sake of our readers and writers'. Photograph: Eamonn McCabeAlison Flood2009-01-29T15:42:52ZGreat modern buildings: Thomas Keneally on the Sydney Opera Househttp://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2007/oct/15/architecture.sydney
Children run on its concrete skirts under a blue sky (well, often it is blue), and do not need to be hushed. A building children can feel ownership of is more than a mere opera house<p>When I was a child the point of Sydney Cove on which the Opera House stands was the Fort Macquarie Tram Depot. It was characteristic of us Sydneysiders to put a tram depot there, because Sydney has always been a city which depended on the massive grace of the glittering harbour to absolve it from its manifold architectural and environmental crimes. Much earlier, this point of land had been Tubowgule to the indigenes of the Eora language group, and a place so significant that Australia's version of Moctezuma, the Aboriginal named Bennelong, cleverly had a house built there for himself by a governor - an early case of an Aboriginal land claim.</p><p>So this low promontory of the harbour was a significant site from of old, and always had more to do with magic than with trams. It is a wonderful place for a grand, iconic building like the one there now. All around it lie the surprisingly deep waters of the harbour. In a port of ships it stands as our cultural clipper. Its cargo is Ibsen, Strindberg, O'Neill, Mozart, Handel, Bach, the Wiggles and Captain Feathersword. The people of Sydney, in speaking of their city, always mention &quot;the sails&quot; of the Opera House. That is, they get its message. They are on a voyage, as were their forebears. They cherish the place for reminding them of that.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2007/oct/15/architecture.sydney">Continue reading...</a>ArchitectureTravelSydneySydney Opera House, Sydney, AustraliaArt and designCultureMon, 15 Oct 2007 11:24:30 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2007/oct/15/architecture.sydneyThomas Keneally2007-10-15T11:24:30ZThe Hay relay story: chapter three by Thomas Keneallyhttp://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/may/27/hayrelaystorychapterthree
Now the possibility that he might be expected to make an erotic overture made him edgy. When did sleep replace sex as the ultimate currency of contentment?<p><img height="300" width="460" src="http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/books/keneally460.jpg" alt="keneally460.jpg" /></p><p>The Hay relay story so far: <a href="http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/05/the_hay_relay_story_chapter_one_by_beryl_bainbridge.html">Chapter 1 by Beryl Bainbridge</a> <a href="http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/05/the_hay_relay_chapter_two_by_r.html">Chapter 2 by Rose Tremain</a></p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/may/27/hayrelaystorychapterthree">Continue reading...</a>BooksSun, 27 May 2007 08:01:18 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/may/27/hayrelaystorychapterthreeThomas Keneally2007-05-27T08:01:18ZSchindler's Ark: genesishttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/may/19/featuresreviews.guardianreview6
Thomas Keneally on the genesis of Schindler's Ark<p>It was considered improbable that Schindler's Ark would win the Booker Prize of 1982. It was a work of faction, perhaps, in the Capote mode. It could be described as a documentary novel, but was it a real novel? I was so certain of the book's lack of a chance that I drank my nervous publisher's cognac at the end of the dinner in the splendid Guild Hall, certain there was no chance I would be called on to speak.</p><p>The controversy which followed my being called to the rostrum was a wondrous thing, the equivalent of archbishops condemning one's book from the pulpit, a fruitful service to the publishing industry which archbishops have sadly grown less willing to perform. In any case, my most uncharacteristic book, the one with which my name has become identified, was thus accepted by the reading public and ultimately by Steven Spielberg.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/may/19/featuresreviews.guardianreview6">Continue reading...</a>Thomas KeneallyBooksCultureFri, 18 May 2007 23:09:06 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/may/19/featuresreviews.guardianreview6Thomas Keneally2007-05-18T23:09:06ZReview: The English Dane by Sarah Bakewellhttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/apr/16/featuresreviews.guardianreview16
King of Iceland, prisoner, writer and fearless campaigner, Jorgen Jorgenson was a 19th-century man for all seasons. Thomas Keneally is fascinated by Sarah Bakewell's account of his eventful life, The English Dane<p><strong>The English Dane</strong> <br />by Sarah Bakewell<br />324pp, Chatto &amp; Windus, &pound;18.99</p><p>Sarah Bakewell has a fine story to tell, and she is its skilled servant. It is the story of Jorgen Jorgenson, an extraordinary Georgian figure who would have been invented by some novelist had he not in fact existed. &quot;There is something about Jorgen Jorgenson that drives people to enumerate, multiply, accumulate and replicate,&quot; writes Bakewell. As soon as you have said he is a revolutionary you must also say he was an anti-Napoleonic Anglophile. As soon as you say he was an enthusiast you must entertain the possibility that he was, to quote Bakewell, &quot;Toad of Toad Hall&quot;, and as soon as you say he was one of the founders of Van Diemen's Land and grand protector of Iceland, you have also to mention that he was a British convict. Jorgenson is remembered both as king of Iceland for one heady summer at one end of the globe, and the Viking of Van Diemen's Land at the other, and to an extent he seems a being created by the Earth's zapping north-south electric field. When the Prince of Denmark recently wedded his Tasmanian (Van Diemen's Land) wife, he declared he followed in the earlier Dane, Jorgenson's, footsteps with just as much hope and just as much confidence. The prince did not mention Jorgenson's endlessly zealous, inventive and disordered brilliance.</p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/apr/16/featuresreviews.guardianreview16">Continue reading...</a>BooksHigher educationBiographyHistoryEducationCultureSat, 16 Apr 2005 00:01:02 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/apr/16/featuresreviews.guardianreview16Thomas Keneally2005-04-16T00:01:02ZThomas Keneally tells how he stumbled on the story that became Schindler's Listhttp://www.theguardian.com/film/2004/jun/18/1
Leopold Page, a Beverly Hills bag-seller, spent years trying to persuade people to make a film about the man who had saved him and his wife from the Nazis. At last he found someone. Thomas Keneally tells how he stumbled on the story that became Schindler's List<p>In Los Angeles, in late October 1980, I was feeling the strange, malign electricity the Santa Ana winds bring to the city. The heat and challenge of the wind swept along Wilshire Boulevard as I went out to buy a modestly priced briefcase in Beverly Hills. Passing exorbitant Rodeo Drive on my left, I saw, stretching away south, a street that seemed to have normal shops, and family cars bearing the normal scuffs of suburban use. </p><p>I had not gone far along South Beverly when I encountered the Handbag Studio. I hesitated. I had always been a cautious shopper. But the proprietor soon appeared at the door. He had a stocky Slavic look, and resembled the great character actor Theodore Bikel - a touch of Tartar in the cheeks, a barrel chest. He was impeccably shirted and jacketed, and an Eagle Scout pin nested in his lapel. There was a glitter of fraternal amusement in his eyes. Even then, I believe I perceived that he had dealt in markets beyond my knowing. </p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/film/2004/jun/18/1">Continue reading...</a>Thomas KeneallyFilmCultureSchindler's ListFri, 18 Jun 2004 01:50:08 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/film/2004/jun/18/1Thomas Keneally2004-06-18T01:50:08ZGulags in the sun: Australia's immigration policyhttp://www.theguardian.com/uk/2004/feb/21/immigration.australia
Thomas Keneally has taped his mouth shut in silent protest at the inhuman immigration policy of his homeland, Australia. Here he lets rip about the detentions, and the deceit surrounding them, that are so corrupting of politics<p>'For those who've come across the seas<br /> We've boundless plains to share... ' </p><p>It seems to some Australians a great loss of innocence that such anodyne lines cannot now be sung without a shared wink of irony with a kindred soul, someone as disappointed as I am over the Australian government's infamous detention policy for asylum seekers. The truth is that there exist in our plain outer suburbs, such as Villawood in Sydney, and in our desert towns, such as Port Hedland in Western Australia, double-walled gulags for would-be refugees. Those who, with documents or without, sincerely or opportunistically, come from afar to seek asylum have been detained and isolated there, as a virus too toxic to be released, behind high walls topped by razor wire. </p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2004/feb/21/immigration.australia">Continue reading...</a>Thomas KeneallyImmigration and asylumAustralia newsWorld newsUK newsLife and styleSocietyAsia PacificAustralian politicsSat, 21 Feb 2004 01:40:46 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/uk/2004/feb/21/immigration.australiaThomas Keneally2004-02-21T01:40:46ZThomas Keneally's Antartic journeyhttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/sep/27/featuresreviews.guardianreview1
In 1968, Thomas Keneally brought home an illict souvenir from Antartica. This year, haunted by the landscape - and troubled by his conscience - he embarked on a journey to return his plunder<p>I first went to Antarctica in 1968, for somewhat under a fortnight. In those days one could visit the continent only as a member of an official group, and the American ambassador in Canberra, Bill Crook, a noble soul who would later give his life to a disease caught while working for an Episcopalian aid agency in Ethiopia, invited me to go with him, as a member of his party. Through the ambassador, I was able to experience the giant landscapes and improbable, barely polluted vistas of Antarctica in so profound a way that it recurred in my dreams for decades. In particular, the huge Transantarctic mountains, complicated peaks and glaciers that start behind Cape Adare on the northern limit of the Ross sea and run south across the continent, returned to me in sleep. Scott's own beloved and much researched Royal Society range, visible from the bases across McMurdo Sound, are just one part of this transcendent chain. </p><p>We went to Ross Island, that historic mass in McMurdo Sound which is cemented to the rest of Antarctica by the Ross Ice Shelf, an august chunk of ice the size of France, and visited Scott's two huts and Shackleton's haunted Cape Royds hut, and lived beneath the midnight sun. This trip augmented a tendency of mine to see Antarctica as another state of being. Nobody was a native of the place. Only in the past 60 or 70 years had a scatter of human myths become associated with it. But even in its massiveness it had made no tribe unto itself. It had provoked no native tongue, no rites, no art, no jingoism. Its landscapes existed without the permission of humanity. And everything I looked at, even the nullity of the pole, produced jolts of insomniac chemicals in my system. It was not landscape, it was not light. It was super-landscape, super-light, and it would not let you sleep. </p> <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/sep/27/featuresreviews.guardianreview1">Continue reading...</a>Thomas KeneallyBooksBiographyFictionCultureSat, 27 Sep 2003 00:21:49 GMThttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/sep/27/featuresreviews.guardianreview1Thomas Keneally2003-09-27T00:21:49Z